The Recruit
by Silver Simmons
Summary: Charged with a crime he didn't technically commit, Perseus Jackson is put in jail. But when trouble arises within S.H.I.E.L.D maybe involving a piece of evidence collected from the scene of Percy's crime, the organization may have to recruit a criminal.
1. Chapter 1

**Here is my new story. It takes place after Heroes of Olympus. Since this is just the prologue its gonna be shorter than normal. The first chapter should be up sometime in the semi-near future. Enjoy!**

**I don't own anything except for the plot.**

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><p><strong>Prologue<strong>

"And the last story on tonight's news hour is a follow-up from a top story last year. Some of you may remember, but last year, in a New York subway station, a man, who has been identified as Perseus Jackson, age 18, attacked and killed an unarmed businessman with a fatal strike to the head. Surprisingly enough, the man has still not been identified. Mr. Jackson insisted he had to do it, and he was protecting himself and everyone else, but he has been charged wih murder. He was awaiting a trial for about a year, up until yesterday. A man, who must remain anonymous, visited Perseus and requested to have him released. Now, we have no access to the conversation but this man somehow convinced the New York Police to release Mr. Jackson into his custody. It hasn't been confirmed if bribery or foul play were involved. If any more details are revealed, you'll hear it here first. And that's it for tonight's news hour, thank you for tuning in."

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><p><strong>Percy figured he only had about 45 seconds to live.<strong>

Ah, the life of a demigod. He was pinned against a wall of the subway train by something he had never seen before, and would be happy to never see again. It kept morphing its limbs into whatever suited its preference. The one thing that didn't change was its haunting clear blue eyes, with a devilish gleam in them. Around its neck was an illuminated blue stone that looked too flawless to be natural. _"I'm guessing it wants me dead, as most monsters do... _Percy didn't know what the mortals saw, but they ran to the back of the subway, scared.

"You're going down, Perseus Jackson. I'm going to destroy you, the way those pitiful Greeks couldn't." The thing snarled, baring its yellowing teeth, spitting on Percy's face. He almost gagged.

Rolling his eyes, Percy began, "I'd like to see you tr-" His sentence was cut off with a gasp as the thing's grip around his throat tightened.

Percy felt claws pierce his skin, and blood trickle down his neck. Digging his fingernails into the monsters greasy arm, Percy tried to pry the thing off his neck. Glancing sideways, he saw a little toddler crying in fear. _"If the monster kills me,"_ Percy thought, _"Would it attack the mortals?"_

The subway train lurched to a stop, but to get to the door, the mortals would have to go around the fight.

**"Freeze!"** A deep, gruff voice commanded, a from a few feet away. Both Percy and the monster snapped their heads that way. A squad of burly men, all armed with guns, were glaring at us. They all wore the same badge. NYPD.

_"Aw great."_ Percy thought to himself.

The monster released its grip on Percy's neck, and he fell to ground, gasping and coughing. A few of the police were ushering people off the subway. The monster turned and snarled as he advanced toward the police, who held their positions, pointing their guns at it. Through the mist, the mortals saw a confused business man.

"The boy just attacked me with his bat! I was protecting myself. Be rational men. Its not my fault." He walked slowly toward them with open arms.

Percy saw the police lowering their guns, trusting the monster's (or buisness man's) clever ploy. He knew the monster was going to kill the police. Percy couldn't let it hurt mortals. When the police were distracted, he reached toward his sword. He picked it up and stabbed the monster in the back. He heard the gasps of the mortals as they saw Percy attacking a man. As it fell to the ground, Percy breathed a sigh of relief and ran a hand through his hair.

"Drop the baseball bat and put your hands up." The main officer growled at Percy.

"What?" Percy turned and faced the officer, his eyebrows furrowed in confusion.

"You heard me, drop the baseball bat or I'll shoot."

"Baseball ba-" Percy realized he must be talking about Riptide through the mist. "Okay." He said slowly as he slowly moved my hand out, never breaking eye contact with the officer.

The sword fell to the ground with a loud clang. One of the officers kicked it away and it skidded down the train, out of sight. Percy raised his hands above his head to symbolize surrender. _"Even though those guns wouldn't hurt the monster, they could still do some serious damage to me."_

Waiting for Riptide to reappear in his pocket, Percy knew he had to escape. He started glancing around trying to find a way out. _"If I got caught by mortal authorities, it would only end badly."_ Percy thought as he lowered his head a bit. His ebony coloured hair fell in front of his face, hiding the fact he was looking around. An officer went behind him to search him for weapons.

Glancing down the train, Percy noticed an open door near the front. He would have to distract the officers, so he could get a few seconds before they shoot. _"But how would I distract them.. Got it." _

Once he felt the reassuring weight of Riptide in my pocket, Percy knew it was time.

He flexed one of his fists open, causing the water fountains and emergency fire sprinklers to explode and spray water everywhere. He spun around, ripped his arms out of the officer's hands, and punched him in the nose.

Then, he took off down the train, Converses pounding against the train floor. Percy turned around and shouted "Sorry!" to the officers. He genuinely felt bad for punching that guy in the nose.

Suddenly deafening pops filled the air. **_"They're shooting at me.. They're shooting at me!"_** In a moment of panic, Percy slowed down a bit. But the sound of glass shattering and screams from the civilians shook him out of it and he sped up even more. He bolted through the train doors, jumped over a boundary, bounded up an **Out of Order **escalator and out of the subway station. As Percy's eyes adjusted to the harsh light of the summer, his breath hitched. There were at least 5 police cars and 15 armed officers. And the officers that were down on the train had just emerged from the station and were blocking the return path. He froze and looked around, but couldn't find any way to escape. Percy couldn't beat these guys, not without showing his powers in front of all these people. He pulled out Riptide in pen form, and was about to uncap it just to scare them off, when Percy felt like he was being electrocuted. He fell to the ground, unconscious.

**"We got him, sir."**

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><p><strong>There we go. That was the prologue.<strong>** Side note, I kind of made up the monster I used. Anyways, I've got some good ideas for the next chapter, involving at least one avenger. Well, hes not really an avenger, but he does assemble them... *wink wink* I will post the next chapter when I can. I just have to write it first...**

**I hope you **enjoyed.** Bye! :D**

**-Silver **


	2. Chapter 2

**Next chapter lets go whoop whoop.**

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><p><strong>"We haven't got him sir."<strong>

The police chief swiveled his chair around, one eyebrow raised.

"What?" He breathed.

The young officer, Daniel James, stood up straighter. "The victim's identification."

"Excuse me?"

"The victim of Perseus Jackson's murder."

'What do you mean? You haven't got his identification yet?!" Chief Morgan's voice was rapidly rising.

"We can't find him." Officer James placed the file of Perseus' case on Chief Morgan's desk. Pushing his chair forward, Chief Morgan slowly reached for the document and started flipping through it. "We've searched databases, contacted witnesses, and had the top officers on this case for weeks. The man doesn't exist."

"Anything the victim had with him that could identify him? Wallet, Cellphone?" The chief questioned.

"Nope. The only things he had on him were a couple subway tokens and this," The officer took out a small box from his pocket, along with two pairs of rubber gloves. He handed one pair the chief, and put the other pair on himself. He dramatically opened the box and took out a small blue stone, perfectly round. Officer James placed it on the table. The chief leaned forward. Under close inspection, it seemed to be pulsating.

"What is this?"

Daniel glanced up from stone. "He was wearing it on a chain around his neck."

"Take it out to the secure labs. Test it. Find out what it is and why he had it."

"Yes sir."

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><p><strong>Percy had been in jail for two days.<strong> **And he _despised_ it.**

It was dark and dirty and lonely. Nobody talked to Percy or even acknowleged his exsistence. The inmates, all adults, were huge and cruel. And he missed Annabeth. That was the worst thing. Ever since they survived Tartarus together, they couldn't stand to be apart. All Percy did all day is lay in bed and think of all the ways he could escape and get back to Annabeth and his family. He could. He could get out of this hellhole anytime he wanted, but his gut told him to stay a while. Those were his last thoughts before he fell into a deep sleep.

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><p>"This doesn't exsist." The British scientist, Dr. Phillip Micheal looked up at Officer James. "The chemical makeup doesn't exist. Not in our databases at least."<p>

"But our databases retrieve intel from all across the world. How can it not exist?"

"I'm just as confused as you are."

"Something just can't exist. Has it not been discovered yet? Maybe it's classified." As the officer stood up, his hip bumped into a table, knocking over a bunch of test tubes. Dr. Micheal facepalmed. Officer James was talking more to himself than he was to the scientist. Unconsciously, he ran a hand through his shaggy dark brown hair. Officer James turned to the scientist. "Is it classified?"

"How am I supposed to know?" Dr. Micheal rolled his pale eyes at Officer James. "Call up Chief Morgan."

"Okay." Officer James walked out the lab, leaving Dr. Micheal alone.

"Twit." Dr. Micheal mumbled, getting up to clean up the test tubes Officer James spilled.

A few minutes later there was a hard knock at door, and Dr. Micheal, assuming it was Officer James, opened it.

He was met with a shotgun pointed against his head.

**"Hand over the stone."**

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><p>Three loud knocks got Percy out of bed pretty quickly. His eyes flew open and he shot up reaching for Riptide in pen form, out of instinct.<p>

"Someone's out here, willingly wasting a precious hour of their life to talk to you Mr. Jackson. Get up."

Percy fell back onto his bed, and sighed. It was probably his mom again. He rolled out of bed and walked out of his cell, after glancing in a mirror to fix his bed hair. Still half asleep, he followed the guard down the hall.

"Looking bright eyed and bushy tailed aren't ya seaweed brain?" a sarcastic voice said behind him. Percy instantly perked up. He spun around and his tired sea green eyes met pale grey eyes with one eybrow raised.

"Annabeth!" Percy grinned, going in for a hug. She pushed him back.

"What the hell are you doing in jail?!" She whisper-shouted glancing back at the guard down the hall, watching them. Percy opened his mouth to explain, but she continued on. "I came as soon as I could. Sally called me with the news that you were charged with murder" - she particuarly stressed the word - "and she asked me to come and sort this out. What did you do?'

Percy explained "I had to do it! I was attacked by a monster, and it was going to attack the mortals, so I killed it. The mortals must have saw me kill a man."

"Why didn't you manipulate the mist?"

"It was kind of a high stress situation, as I was being shot at!" Percy gesticulated wildly.

Annabeth nervously looked up at the ceiling, closed her eyes and breathed out. Her conflicted stormy grey eyes stared at Percy "I don't know how we're going to get you out of this seaweed brain. I can't really use reverse pyscholgy on the NYPD. I can't-"

Percy leaned in and held Annabeth's hands. "We'll thing of something, wise girl. We always do." At that Percy gave her a long comforting hug.

She mumbled into his shoulder. "Okay, seaweed brain."

Once the hug broke apart, Percy did his signature goofy grin. "Can I kiss you now?"

Annabeth sweetly smiled and leaned into Percy "Of course." Percy wrapped his arms around Annabeth's waist, their lips about to meet.

"Hey, yo, kids, no PDA." The guard interjected, pulling the two apart. Percy looked at his feet and smiled sheepishly. Annabeth rolled her eyes.

"By the way," He continued glancing at the clock. "Your time is almost up."

"Okay thank you." Annabeth said calmly. The guard walked away, and sat down a few metres from them.

"That was short." She turned to Percy.

He responded "I guess so."

"Well, I have to get back to camp." Annabeth said, putting her hand on Percy's shoulder, then moving it down his arm to hold his hand. He pulled her into a hug, and discreetly kissed her cheek. She giggled. She stood on her tippy-toes and whispered into his ear "Next time I come, I'm bringing Thailia and Nico." She pulled away and added, "If thats okay with you."

"Sure, visit soon wise girl," Percy held her hands.

Annabeth smiled, and it melted Percy's heart, "I'll visit everyday if I can."

"You can't." The guard called over from his chair, getting up. "Time for you to go." He said to Percy

"Let us kiss just once?" Annabeth asked the guard, making her grey eyes big and sad. He glared at her for a moment, then rolled his eyes and agreed reluctantly. "Fine. Make it quick."

Annabeth turned to Percy and crashed her lips into his. He kissed her back. After a few moments, they broke apart, and laughed.

"I love you wise girl," Percy said, as the guard coaxed him back toward his cell.

"Love you too, seaweed brain" she said, standing in the middle of hall, another guard watching her like a hawk. When Percy was down the hall, she shook her head and looked up at the ceiling. "My boyfriend is a criminal." Then she turned around and left, following the guard.

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><p>"I-I don't know what your talking about." Dr. Micheal stuttered, glancing around panicked.<p>

"I know you know what I'm talking about." The girl narrowed her beautiful eyes. You couldn't really tell what colour they were. She has on a black cat suit, weapons hidden all over her. Guns attached to her belt, tasers on her wrists, Dr. Micheal wouldnt be surprised if she had some kind of explosive hidden in her bright red hair.

"Agent Romanoff, calm down, you're scaring the poor guy." A man, armed with a bow and arrow strutted in, arms crossed. He pushed Nat's arm with the gun down and away from Dr. Micheal.

"Agent Barton, follow procedure." The girl, apparently Agent Romanoff, said stiffly.

Agent Barton walked over to Dr. Micheal, who was just standing there, mouth half open, confused. Agent Barton gave him an amused look, and straight into Dr. Micheal's thick glasses.

Agent Romanoff slightly raised her gun again. "The stone, Doctor..." She glanced at his lab coat, at his name tag. "Phillip Micheal."

"Stone stone... Umm, could you possibly specify what kind of stone?" He said slowly, backing up a bit, trying to get closer to the desk with the pendant stone.

Agent Romanoff nodded slightly at Barton. He started walking around the lab, trying to find the stone.

"Doctor, we work for an organization more important than this one. And that stone is involved with something bigger than you could ever imagine. So, hand over the stone" Agent Romanoff explained vaguely.

At that moment, Officer James decided to walk in with Chief Morgan.

"Chief Morgan - What the hell?!" Officer James exclaimed, whipping out his gun and pointing at Agent Romanoff. Chief Morgan did as well. Their guns were tiny in comparsion to Agent Romanoff's weapon. Agent Barton, in response to them taking out their weapons, armed his bow with an arrow set to stun and pointed at the back of Officer James' head.

"Ummm... I don't have a weapon." Dr. Micheal said with wide eyes and hands up in surrender.

Agent Romanoff read their name tags and said,"Officer Daniel James, Chief Joesph Morgan," She took out her badge."Listen up. I'm Agent Romanoff and this is Agent Barton. We work for S.H.I.E.L.D."

Chief Morgan lowered his gun. That's an important government department and if you refuse what they want, you don't get see another day.

Romanoff continued "we were sent here under the command of Director Nicolas Fury. If any scans show up with this chemical make up," she said, handing a paper to Dr. Micheal, "We are sent in to collect it. Its a very dangerous substance, and in the wrong hands it is deadly. So, I implore you to hand over the stone and anything you have on where and how you found it, or we will be displeased."

Dr. Micheal looked at Chief Morgan.

"What are you waiting for Doctor? Give them the rock!" Chief Morgan exclaimed, before turning to Officer James. "And you, you go get every file we have on this." Agent Romanoff and Agent Barton lowered their weapons.

"Perseus Jackson's case?" Officer James clarified. Agent Romanoff and Agent Barton exchanged looks.

"Whichever case involves that stone."

"Yes sir." Officer James, left the room once again.

Dr. Micheal handed the box to Agent Barton, who opened it to make sure the stone was in there. It was.

"I wouldn't suggest touching it, it has high levels of radiation."

"We're aware of that." Agent Romanoff said shortly as she walked out. "Thank you, for your cooperation."

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><p>Agent Romanoff and Agent Barton walked out of the police station, reiciving a few wierd looks.<p>

"Yo, nice arrows, Katniss" A teenage criminal with light blond hair, being escorted with his hands behind his back. Agent Romanoff tried her hardest to hold in her laughter.

Agent Barton slowly turned around to face the teen. He lowered his sunglasses, and raised his eyebrows and gave the teen a look like "Seriously?" The kid bit his lip and looked away.

As they got close to the car, Agent Romanoff metioned, "Don't let Tony hear anyone calling you that, you won't hear the end of it."

Realization flashed across Barton's face as he imagined it. "You'd better not metion it to him."

"Okay... Katniss." Agent Romanoff smirked, as she slid into the passenger seat of the car. Agent Barton rolled his eyes, then smilied slightly, before getting into the car himself.

Once they were on the road back to base, Agent Romanoff dialed Director Fury's number.

**"We've got it sir."**

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><p><strong>Ta-da! Done that chapter! I'm proud of myself for uploading that, only 5 days after the first chapter. I'm planning on updating every weekend, but I will be kind of busy this summer, so if there is any changes in my schedule I'll say. <strong>

**So, I hope you enjoyed reading this chapter! **

**-Silver :) **


	3. Chapter 3

**Hey guys, **

**I'm so grateful for everyone who comments, favorites, follows and even if you just decided to click on this story. You all mean so much to me, and I smile at every single notification I get. I'm super surprised at the kind feedback I've been getting from you guys. I just hit 80 followers. THAT'S WOAH, AMAZING You're all so AWESOME! Thank you so much! :) :) :)**

**ONTO THE CHAPTER! (Blah blah disclaimer disclaimer blah.)**

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><p>"Dr. Banner, thank you for coming on such short notice." Director Fury turned towards the two geniuses. "Mr. Stark, you didn't have to come."<p>

"Hey!" Tony exclaimed, acting offended. "I'm useful."

Director Fury raised his eyebrows. "Anyways," He snapped his fingers and the agent next to him stepped up, holding a small metal box. Fury continued, "This was found by the NYPD at the scene of a crime. A murder, committed by an 18 year old, one Perseus Jackson."

Fury handed a thin file to Bruce, who started flipping through it, but it was Tony quickly snatched it away by Tony. Bruce didn't really care. He was watching Director Fury unlatch the metal box. The doctor nudged Tony, gesturing toward Fury.

Inside the box was a small bright blue glowing rock that was perfectly circular.

"What does that look like to you?"

Tony took a step forward. An image flashed through his head, an image of a sceptre prodded violently pushed into his chest.

"Loki's sceptre." Tony said quietly, looking at his feet. Looking up, he said **"The Tesseract."**

"Correct." Fury acknowledged Tony's answer. "It has almost exactly the same chemical make-up as the Tesseract. Banner, I need to know all about the substance this thing is made from. Gamma radiation, similarities and differences, patterns in the heat signature, anything supernatural. And Stark, I need everything you can find out about this Jackson kid. He may have something to do with it."

"Yes, sir!" Tony mock-saluted.

"Go to the labs." Director Fury turned on his heel. "Let me know if you need anything".

"Well, actually, there IS something.." Tony began.

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><p>"This Perseus kid is amazing." Tony said aloud, looking up from his tablet and making himself more comfortable on the bean bag chair he had requested from Fury.<p>

Bruce glanced over from a laptop plugged into a microscope. "In what way?"

"He blew up the frickin' St. Louis Arch!"

Bruce rolled his eyes. "He's obviously a juvenile delinquent. And he murdered someone, Tony."

"And a piece of Loki's spectre was found at the crime scene. There's something here we're not seeing" Tony muttered under his breath. He dropped his eyes and went back to his research, or as Bruce called it, stalking.

After a few moments, Tony stood up, tossed his tablet onto the bean bag and started talking again, "Want to know what else I have found out about your juvenile delinquent?"

"Well, so far we have terrorism and murder, so there has to be burglary and assault, grand theft auto, maybe smuggling, drugs-"

"Listen up, anger management. Perseus Jackson was born on August 18th, 1993. He was raised by his single mother, Sally Jackson. When he was in third grade, a large man followed Percy around when he was at school, but by threatening to call the police, the teachers eventually got the man to leave. According to his teachers, Perseus insisted that the man had one eye, although no one else noticed this. Then in fifth grade, he somehow fired a war memorial cannon which hit the school bus. An accident, he claimed"

"That's what they all say" Bruce scoffed.

"Our boy's been expelled from six schools in six years. In his freshman year at Goode High he broke the school's band room window by jumping out of it..." Tony checked to make sure he had read that right. He had. "But surprisingly he was unhurt and, even more surprisingly, not expelled."

"He had a stepfather named Gabe Ugliano for a while, until he died unexpectedly," Tony continued.

"Did he use the baseball bat or the cannon to off his Daddy?" Bruce smirked.

"Can it. Moving right along, when he was about 15, his mom got engaged to Paul Blofish, a teacher at Goode High. And Percy went missing for a period of time when he was sixteen. And there's a closed case about a manhunt involving Percy and two other kids when he was twelve. And some unexplained activity in Epirus last year that some witnesses say was supernatural."

Tony breathed out and Bruce gave him a weird look. "This kid gets around." He walked over to Bruce. "What's happening with your research?"

Bruce took of his glasses. "Fury's right. The chemical composition and everything else is almost identical to the Tesseract and Loki's sceptre. They could be the same thing. From what I have so far, they are the same thing."

"That's not good."

"Where was it found again?"

Tony checked the file. "On a chain around the victim's neck. A medallion."

"Okay." Bruce paused. "I think we need to speak to this Perseus kid. He may know something. It can't be a coincidence that the one guy he killed had a stone identical to the Tesseract around his neck."

"Good point." Tony added, "I do want to meet this kid."

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><p>Two days after Annabeth's visit, Percy had someone else request to speak with him.<p>

"Rise and shine, Perseus, you got a visitor! Only two days since the last one! You're a popular guy, for a murderer!"

"Don't call me Perseus," Percy yawned. But he was wide awake inside. His first thought was that it was Annabeth again. He smiled broadly and jumped out of bed, quickly brushed his teeth and fixed his hair. He wanted to look good for his girlfriend. He checked his efforts in the small mirror and figured that almost presentable would have to do. He followed the guard's heels down the hall, glancing around for Annabeth. But he never found those bright grey eyes.

The guard led Percy into the visiting area, opened a door to a small room and gestured for Percy to go inside. "Bang on the door when you're done… Perseus" the guard said, closing the door behind him. Percy walked slowly through the room towards the window.

"Mr. Jackson" a male voice said behind him. Percy turned around, and his shoulders sagged.

"You're not my girlfriend." he said, disappointed. Two men were standing there. Both had dark brown hair and brown eyes. One was wearing a button down blue shirt, khaki pants and thin glasses. The second man had jeans, a Led Zeppelin t-shirt and some serious facial hair. Percy noticed a glowing blue light under his shirt, in the middle of his chest.

"You're not my type, kid." The second man said sarcastically. He stepped forward. "I'm Tony Stark," he said, and paused like he was expecting a reaction.

Percy looked at him blandly, and blinked twice.

"I said, I'm Tony Stark." Tony repeated.

"Yes, and..." Percy stretched out his words.

"Do you have a hearing problem or something 'cause-" Tony began, but Bruce cut him off.

"I'm Bruce Banner." He held out his hand for Percy to shake. Percy slowly extended his hand, and shook Bruce's, giving him a suspicious look.

Bruce lowered his voice a bit. **"We work for S.H.I.E.L.D."**

"Not technically work." Tony mumbled just loud enough for them to hear.

Percy took a step back. That sounded serious.

"That stands for a whole lot of words that are really long and stupid." Tony interjected.

"The Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement and Logistics Division is a lot of things, but stupid isn't one of them" Bruce said, annoyed.

"Whatever," Tony said dismissively. "Thing is, Perseus, we have a few little questions to ask you that really can't be discussed here. So we need you to come with us."

"What, are you planning on breaking me out of jail, 'cause you could get arrested for that" Percy said, wondering if the room was bugged.

"Don't pull the 'get arrested' card on me, jailbird." Tony snapped. "Jolly green giant," Tony said, addressing Bruce, "Go sort things out with the authorities."

Tony was rambling on about something but Percy tuned him out. He was paying more attention to what Bruce was doing. Bruce walked over to the door and knocked twice. When the guard opened the door and came in Bruce took out a small badge that kind of had the shape of an eagle. The guard's eyes widened when he saw the badge. Bruce and the guard quietly exchanged a few words. The guard said something into his radio, waited a second, and then it looked like he got the answer Bruce wanted. The guard nodded at Bruce and gave Tony a thumbs up.

"You're good to go," he said. "Bring him back or keep him locked up there, we really don't care. Just don't let him go."

"Hey! He has a name." Percy exclaimed, offended.

"Okay… Perseus." The guard said, stressing his name, because he knew how much Percy hated being called that. The name reminded Percy of monsters and gods, because that's what they all call him. When they try to kill him.

"You know, I think I prefer 'him'."

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><p>Tony and Bruce were on either side of Percy as they escorted him towards Tony's convertible. His arms were uncomfortably bound behind his back with handcuffs. Bruce opened up the door to the backseat and Percy slid in. Then, Bruce closed and carefully locked the door before getting into the passenger seat. beside Tony was already in the driver's seat. Before Tony and Bruce had come to get Percy, Tony had installed little an armoured transparent panel between the back seat and the front seats, just in case Percy decided to try and attack them. But Bruce was starting to doubt it was needed, because Percy seemed perfectly calm and sane. So far.<p>

"So, how's jail?" Tony said, glancing in the rearview mirror as he was backing out.

"As good as it could ever be," Percy said, looking out the window. "What do you want to ask me anyway?"

"We'll tell you when we get there." Bruce said, turning his head around and slightly smiling at Percy.

"Get where?"

"We ask the questions, kid. Here's one." Tony started. Bruce shot him a warning look, which he ignored. "Why did you do it?"

"Do what?"

**"Murder."**

Umm.. Well..." Percy tried to think of what to say._ "I can't let them know who I am."_ He thought to himself.

"If you're not comfortable in answering, Percy.." Bruce dropped his sentence after a look from Tony. He obviously wanted to know, and when Tony wants something…

"I-uh had to protect everyone on the subway." Percy answered, a little too laid back, in Tony's opinion.

Tony opened his mouth to say something else, but Bruce whispered something that made him change his mind.

* * *

><p><strong>Bruce watched Percy.<strong>

(Not in a creepy way or anything.)

He watched him in the rearview mirror on the car ride to the helicarrier. He saw the way Percy looked out his window and looked at the people on the streets. He didn't look like an insane a lunatic teen who had murdered an unarmed man with a baseball bat. He looked like a normal teenager. On the way to get Percy, Bruce had been expecting a rude, snarky, and most likely insane juvenile delinquent. But Percy seemed to be none of these things the exact opposite. Bruce felt bad for the kid.

**Percy knew Bruce was watching him.**

(It was creepy.)

Percy felt his eyes watching him in the through rearview mirror. Percy just awkwardly stared out the window, wishing he would turn around. He didn't.

* * *

><p>"Well, here we are." Tony said, stopping the car beside a helicopter pad.<p>

Bruce turned around to face Percy and noticed he had fallen asleep.

"How did he sleep through you blasting Highway to Hell down the freeway?" Bruce looked astonished.

"I don't know." He turned toward Percy. "Aww, look at him. So innocent." He said, before shouting "WE'RE HERE KID!"

Percy shot up with so much force, he almost ripped the seatbelt. He grabbed a pen out of his pocket and was about to uncap it, when he froze and his shoulders slumped.

"Forgot where I was." He breathed. "Sorry." He awkwardly put the pen back.

"Okay then."

Tony glanced at Bruce and muttered. "You get out before I unlock his door." Bruce nodded, and got out of car.

Once Bruce was outside Percy's door, Tony unlocked it and got out. Bruce reattached the handcuffs on Percy's wrists and walked forward. Once the helicopter was in view, Percy froze.

"Keep walking Percy." Bruce coaxed him.

Percy dug his heels into the ground. "Nope. No, no, no way."

Tony put two and two together. "You're scared of heights aren't you?"

"Maybe."

Tony started to laugh, but was silenced when Percy glared at him. He coughed to cover it up. "I wasn't laughing."

"I'm not going in a helicopter. No." Percy said, dead serious.

"Umm, you kind of have to." Bruce said.

"I **can't** go in a helicopter." Percy begged with his deep green eyes.

"Why not?" Tony asked. "What's stopping you?"

"Umm.. Family tradition..?"

"I'm not even going to ask." Tony said confused. "Get in the helicopter kid. You'll be fine."

"No." Percy did not want to fly. Zeus didn't exactly like Percy, especially after what happen with the Giant War... Let's not talk about that.

"Too bad." Tony called over a S.H.I.E.L.D guard. They came over and shoved a needle into Percy's arm. Instantly, his limbs stopped fighting against the guard. It was a weak sedative, to make him stop fighting and get into the helicopter. Fury had been watching the whole situation, and had ordered the sedative to be used. He didn't have all day.

"Sorry kid," Tony called from his seat in the front, next to the pilot. "It'll wear off in a moment."

The next thing Percy knew, they we're in the air.

* * *

><p><strong>Well, that's all folks! For this chapter at least. This was kind of a filler chapter, I guess. I'll be back next weekend (probaby) with another chapter. Also, can I thank my dad for helping with my editing, he made this chapter a whole lot better than what it was before. <strong>

**Question: Who are you rooting for in the FIFA finals? Germany or Argentina? **

**Hope you guys are having an amazing summer. Thanks for reading! **

**-Silver :)**


	4. Chapter 4

**WOAH HELLO! 190 followers?! UNBELIEVEABLE! I'm so surprised and amazed! You're all so awesome and I appreciate every single one of you. It's the most amazing feeling for me when I wake up and see I have fanfiction notifications in my inbox. It's really what wakes me up in the morning. So I just wanna say thanks to every single one of you! So just for you guys, something will blow up in this chapter. You're welcome. **

**I know I basically disappeared off the face of the internet, but I changed my mind about the direction of the story, so I had to rewrite some. And it's not like I accidentally played Mario Cart for 4 hours a day or anything...pfft that's ridiculous... like who would do- Okay fine I did. ITS ADDICTING! Forgive me please.**

**Anyways, onto the chapter! **

* * *

><p>"Oh gods." Percy clamped his hands down on his arm rests as the helicopter climbed higher into the air.<p>

Tony turned to face Percy. "Kid, calm down, it's just a helicopter."

"Just a helicopter?! We could all die!" Percy said, dead serious.

"It's perfectly safe," Bruce reasoned.

"Not for me!" Percy hesitantly looked out the window at the Hudson far below. His eyes quickly widened before he slammed himself back into his chair. "I'm doomed!"

"We're not going to crash, Percy." Bruce turned to the pilot. "Everything is fine, right?"

"No need to worry, my man," the pilot answered with confidence.

He was wrong.

* * *

><p>"Rules." Annabeth whipped her head around to face Nico and Thalia.<p>

They both groaned. "Seriously?" Thalia complained. "Can't we just go inside?"

"Number one: Be professional. If they think we are untrustworthy or immature, they can refuse to let us see him. So don't be snarky." She gave both a challenging look: _we all know what happens when you do that…_

Thalia interjected. "What if-"

"No." Annabeth cut her off.

After they had reluctantly nodded, she continued. "Number two: Stay where they tell us to. If you break the boundaries and they catch you, they can throw you in jail as well."

"And finally, don't kill Percy." She looked particularly at Thalia, who raised an eyebrow. "In fact, don't kill anyone."

Nico spoke up. "Could I maybe-"

"Let's just say no violence at all." Annabeth got the last word in as she turned and opened the door to the prison waiting room. She confidently walked up to the desk with Thalia and Nico following. Thalia's electric blue eyes took in every detail of the room as she glanced around. Nico slouched along behind her with his head down, barely lifting his feet off the ground. His black hair fell into his dark eyes, concealing that he was carefully examining everything and everyone in the area. He shoved his hands into the pockets of his black jeans.

"Hello, officer," Annabeth said pleasantly, folding her arms on the prison guard's desk and pulling his attention away from his computer. "How are you today?"

The officer grunted something, turned and noticed Nico staring at him though his hair. The officer shook his head and turned back to Annabeth. "What can I do for you, miss?"

Annabeth smiled brightly. "May we speak with Perseus Jackson, cell 24 please?"

"Perseus, Jackson" the guard said to himself as he looked down and painfully typed the letters into his computer and hit return. Annabeth saw his eyes widen as he quickly scanned the computer screen. "Wait here," he said, getting up from his chair and walking away.

Annabeth's eyes followed him through a door behind the desk marked "**PRIVATE. NO UNAUTHORIZED PERSONNEL**". She scanned the reception area for a few moments, waiting for the guard to return. Nico was looking at the floor, doing his bad boy in black thing on her left. Thalia was getting antsy on her right. Really antsy.

After a while, Annabeth started to worry. "This isn't how it happened yesterday," Annabeth whispered to Nico and Thalia. "Something's changed. I wonder what he was reading."

"Well, why don't we just jump over the desk and have a look," said Thalia, putting her hands on the desk.

Annabeth rolled her eyes. "Boundaries, remember? Break them and we could be checking in here – permanently – with Percy. See that mirror on the wall? That's a one way mirror: someone is probably watching us right now. And you just know there are a dozen surveillance cameras in here, even if we can't see them – "

"I could shadow travel around the desk and have a look at his screen," Nico cut her off.

Annabeth bit her lip and looked at Nico. "Okay fine. Go into the restroom first in case they are watching you, and travel from there." Nico lowered his head and slouched away. She turned to Thalia. "Pretend to be talking to me."

"I am talking to you"

"You know what I mean – a pretend conversation. Make it look like we're talking. Hand gestures. Draw attention away from Nico and the officer's desk."

"How about a for-real conversation?" said Thalia. "You know, the whole Nico shadow traveling thing really creeps me out. He's there, then he's not, you don't know where he is, could be behind you." She shivered. "Ugh. Creepy."

"Creepy is my specialty." Nico said behind them, though he hadn't been a few seconds ago. Thalia jumped. "Listen," Nico continued in an urgent whisper, "we have to leave, like, right now. Go to the restroom."

"Girls or boys?"

"Doesn't matter. Do it now, we have to go!"

Thalia and Annabeth looked at each other, turned and strode together towards the women's washroom, with Nico bringing up the rear, looking around furtively. They slipped through the door together, pulled it closed and locked it from the inside. Annabeth smiled to herself. _I wonder what the guy on the surveillance camera is thinking?_

Annabeth looked around the tiny room. Cozy for one, but three's a crowd, she thought. Tiles. Fluorescent lights. A toilet (none too clean), a wash basin, a change table and… no window. Brilliant. She sighed. "So how do you propose we leave, Nico? What's your master plan?"

"In a minute. Listen: I looked at the guard's screen. Percy's rap sheet was up there. He was taken by an organization named S.H.I.E.L.D, like, fifteen minutes ago. We just missed him. And there's a note on the file – bold caps – that if anyone comes to visit him, they are to be detained and the guard is to alert S.H.I.E.L.D Regional Headquarters in Manhattan immediately, so that the visitors can be arrested. Of course, it says 'questioned' on the file, but we all know what _that_ means, right?" Nico looked up at Annabeth. "Look: If they're not still parked outside from earlier, these S.H.I.E.L.D dudes will be well on their way here by now thanks to your friend behind the desk, Miss Perky Pants. We can't help Percy if we're in jail with him. We need to leave. Go to Manhattan. I saw the address and I know where it is. Maybe they have taken Percy there. We need to go there, like now!"

Thalia looked at Nico and opened her mouth to say something, but she was interrupted by some serious banging at the door. They turned around and saw the doorknob turning backwards and forwards, but the cheap lock held – for now.

"What are you doing in there? Come out right now! Open this door!" called someone. The guard? Or the mystery men from S.H.I.E.L.D?

"Give us a minute!" shouted Annabeth. "We're not decent!" Thalia rolled her eyes.

Nico turned to Thalia. "Since you're such a big fan of shadow-traveling, I thought maybe you, me and Annabeth could all do it together." Thalia started protesting. The banging at the door was starting to sound more like kicking. "Quickly – we don't have much time – take my hands, both of you…"

The door burst off its hinges and the guard stumbled in. He looked around. There was no sign of the two girls and the boy. _"What the…"_

A fit looking man in a dark suit ran in behind him, holding up a gold badge. "I'm with S.H.I.E.L.D. Where are the visitors?" he asked breathlessly.

Embarrassed, the guard turned around. "I don't know. They just walked in here about a minute ago– all of them – and, well, they just disappeared".

"They disappeared." It was not a question. The S.H.I.E.L.D agent was not as surprised at this revelation as the guard would have thought. He spoke to his watch. "Director Fury, Mr. Jackson's visitors may have… powers. Class 3 for sure, maybe even Class 2. They have quite literally disappeared, from a locked washroom here at the prison. You know what this could mean."

The guard heard some of the next part of the wristwatch conversation. Director Fury, whoever he was, did not sound pleased.

"Fury out," the guy in the wristwatch signed off. The agent looked up from his watch and stared at the shamefaced guard for a moment. "I need to see your surveillance video. Now. These people may be dangerous. In fact, they may not be people at all…"

* * *

><p>Bruce looked over at Percy, who was gripping his arm rests desperately and mumbling to himself. Maybe praying.<p>

The pilot was whistling. Tony was stroking the touch screen of his mobile device and smiling to himself: Most likely catching up on his fan mail, Bruce thought. The rotors were rotoring. Manhattan was coming up on the horizon. Except for the crazy dark haired kid muttering to himself with his eyes tightly closed like a hallucinating religious fanatic, all was good in helicopter-land.

The pilot turned around. "Not long now-"

An alarm started to shriek in the cockpit. Tony dropped his device. Percy opened his eyes, and Bruce saw pure, raw fear in them. The pilot looked down at his controls. "Someone just locked weapons on us!" he yelled. "I'm taking evasive action! Hold on!"

The pilot threw the helicopter into a steep dive. Percy looked around frantically, wondering how many seconds he had to live this time. "There!" shouted Tony, looking down at the bank of the Hudson, where an average looking businessman in an average dark suit was standing. No briefcase. Instead of a briefcase, he had a long metal tube decorated in an average camouflage pattern sitting on his shoulder, and the tube was pointed at the helicopter. Not good. Following the line of the tube, Tony looked behind himself and saw a small red dot on the wall of the helicopter cabin. "That's a laser guided RPG!" he cried. Just then, he saw a blast of smoke and flame jet from the end of the tube. "He's launched! Turn this thing upwards! Pull up! Get more height! More height! And at two seconds from impact cut everything and DIVE!"

"Releasing countermeasures!" shouted the pilot.

"Don't waste your time!" That's a Stark Industries' RPG. I designed it. Forget countermeasures: they won't do anything. More height, and at-"

"I know. Climbing now!"

In less than a second, it seemed that the helicopter went from vertical down to vertical up. Percy's stomach lurched. The helicopter engines screamed. Tony was also screaming. "More height! We need more height! It's coming fast! Count it off!"

The pilot grimaced as he pulled up on the stick with everything he had. Tony ran forward to the cockpit and knotted his hands over the pilot's to help. "Eight seconds!" yelled the pilot, looking sideways at a screen. "Seven! Six! She's going to stall!"

"No she won't! I designed this helicopter too! Now – MORE HEIGHT!"

"Four seconds! Three! Two!"

"DIVE!"

**Everything happened so fast.** The RPG pierced the air where the helicopter had been two seconds earlier and exploded, far too close. The impact rocked the helicopter, breaking all its windows and sending a shockwave of cold air and broken glass through the cabin. Another alarm joined the party, although it was inaudible over the wind noise in the helicopter.

"I'm losing hydraulics!" shouted the pilot. The helicopter was heading at an unbelievable speed straight towards maybe the fifteenth floor of a tall building on the riverfront. The tall building said "STARK INDUSTRIES" on the top.

"Not that one!" yelled Tony urgently. "It just finished repairs!"

"Pull up and turn left! NOW! Bruce! Could use some help here!"

Bruce ran up and added a third set of hands on the control stick. After what seemed like a million years, the doomed helicopter started to bear left, but not enough. The rotor blades struck the right side of the Stark Tower, causing a small waterfall of broken glass and metal, raining down on to the avenue below. Percy smashed his head on the inside of his door. Bruce ran back to help. All stability gone, the helicopter was now spinning wildly as it moved down and back towards the riverfront. Percy's door flew off its hinges and he was thrown, screaming, out of the helicopter. Bruce reached for him, but it was too late.

**Percy went down into the Hudson River.**

* * *

><p>The shock didn't have time to settle for Tony and Bruce and the pilot, as the helicopter hit the riverfront dock a second or so later, crumpling on contact with the concrete. The impact rippled through the cabin. The next thing Bruce knew there were flames, so he pushed open his door and Tony did the same, grabbing the unconscious pilot with his other hand. Dragging the pilot, they ran out of the burning helicopter seconds before it exploded, sending up an orange and black mushroom cloud a hundred feet into the sky. Tony sat the pilot down against a warehouse wall, and then he and Bruce sprinted to the end of the dock, leaned over the edge and searched for any sign of Percy. His raven coloured hair, his prison uniform, anything. But they saw nothing.<p>

Bruce turned around and mumbled to Tony, his back facing the water. "He's gone. We should go." Tony dropped his head and turned to follow Bruce. Pointing at the pilot, who had slid down the wall: "And this guy definitely needs some-"

"I'm okay!" A young voice called from behind them. Spinning around, Bruce and Tony saw Percy bobbing up and down in water, completely fine.

"What the..? Falling from that height at that kind of speed into water, he should have been flattened!" Bruce looked at Tony, who was clearly just as confused as he was. Percy swam over to a dockside ladder and climbed up, soaking wet. "How come you're not dead?" demanded Tony.

"I guess I'm just lucky." Percy smiled triumphantly. But the smile was wiped off his face seconds later.

"Duck!" he shouted as he reached for his pocket and pulled out a pen. Bruce and Tony did as he said. A gunshot went off behind them, and Percy dived to the ground as the shot whistled by just above his head. Standing up confidently, Percy saw an average looking businessman in an average dark suit. No briefcase. No rocket launcher either: the average looking businessman had traded his for an above average size shotgun. It was smoking and pointed at Percy.

Tony stood up between Percy and the businessman. "Okay calm down, It obviously me you want, I am Tony Stark after all-"

Percy and the businessman didn't break eye contact.

"Guys?"

_What the hell, Lord Business isn't here for me? Who knew?_

Just then, Tony noticed something around the man's neck. Glowing blue, it was the same pendant that had been found on the man that Percy had killed in the businessman jacked his shotgun with an eerie blank expression, chambering another round, and started to walk towards Percy. Very slowly. Almost like a zombie…

Without breaking eye contact, Percy uncapped Riptide and prepared for a fight.

**"Target acquired."**


	5. Chapter 5

**Woah look at that, I'm alive! Sorry I havent updated in like 12 million years... I have procrastination issues. **

**Well, here's the next chapter.**

* * *

><p><em>"I hate this." <em>Repeated over and over in Thalia's dizzy head. Her eyes were open, but she couldn't see anything: it was pitch black. There was a sensation of traveling at enormous speed and spinning at the same time. In total darkness.

One other minor problem: she couldn't breathe. She started to panic. She kept trying to inhale, her level of panic increasing rapidly, and finally felt a desperate gulp of clean air passing into her lungs just as her feet landed on solid ground. Her eyes were almost blinded by sunlight at the same time. She was in some kind of park. Stumbling, she ran over to a nearby bush as she felt like she was going to puke.

She did.

Nico burst out laughing.

Thalia looked up at him, undisguised hate glittering in her eyes, puke and drool dribbling down her chin. "You jerk! It's not funny!"

"Well, it is a bit funny," Nico said, laughter downgraded to an irritating smirk. Annabeth rolled her eyes, shaking her head. She was feeling dizzy and disoriented, but was otherwise unharmed by the shadow travel to New York City. She went over and put an arm around Thalia's heaving shoulders as she retched. "Don't worry, Thalia, you'll be fine-"

"Fine?!" Thalia exclaimed, and retched again. "Fine? I feel like I've had twelve McDonald's Happy Meals, on a rollercoaster, in OUTER FREAKING SPACE!"

"Happy Meals aren't that bad, you know," Nico said. "They're happy and nutritious."

"Plus you get a cool toy." Annabeth added.

Between pukes, Thalia retorted. "Cool if you have the mental age of a six year old."

"Hey, I happen to like Hello Kitty." Nico sounded genuinely offended. "Although I'm still waiting for a Goth one. For my collection."

Thalia straightened up quickly, and stomped over to Nico, wiping her chin with her hand. She pointed a shaking finger in Nico's face. "Don't you ever take me shadow traveling again, you little f-" Annabeth jumped in between them.

"Guys, guys!" She pushed them apart. "We need to concentrate on finding Percy."

"Where are we?" asked Thalia, looking around.

"Central Park, NYC, and you're welcome, by the way – shadow traveling takes some getting used to, but the alternative was jail. A puddle of puke, or jail? Let's see what the studio audience thinks, shall we?" Nico raised his eyebrows in sarcastic question.

Annabeth looked at Thalia. "He has a point."

"He can have the point – of my knife – anytime," said Thalia, but she was starting to calm down. A lifetime in jail is a long time if you're immortal. She looked over at Annabeth and crossed her arms. "OK. So we're in a large park in the largest metropolitan area in the United States. How are we supposed to find one guy here?"

Annabeth started. "Well-" A massive explosion interrupted her. Even though it looked about ten blocks away, they could still feel the ground shake under their feet. A mushroom cloud of black smoke and orange flame rose lazily in the distance. The explosion was followed immediately by a cacophony of alarms and sirens.

Nico smirked. "Found him."

* * *

><p>"Here's the security video you asked for sir." The prison guard pulled up a recording on his computer. The guard and a number of S.H.I.E.L.D. agents huddled together behind the guard to watch. On the screen, the two girls were talking. The boy walked into the bathroom, then walked out moments later, kind of panicked. He caught the attention of the two girls, whispered something and the blonde took the lead into the girls bathroom. The guard returned from the back room, looked around, ran to the washroom and started banging on the door. He burst through the bathroom door. Then the S.H.I.E.L.D agent came in and followed the guard into the bathroom, but the kids were already gone.<p>

The guard hit the spacebar to pause the playback and turned to the S.H.I.E.L.D agents. "We have no idea how they escaped. They just disappeared. There are no windows in the washroom that they could have used to escape. Well, you looked too. There's no way."

The lead agent, Agent Paris, a tall, muscular man with trimmed sideburns and gelled brown hair, not a single strand out of place, stepped forward and handed the prison guard a sheet of paper. "Upload the video file to this address so we can run a facial identification on the three."

"Okay gotcha," The guard said as he took the sheet of paper. He looked at it and typed something into his computer. A minute passed, then the computer made a beep. He looked at Agent Paris and nodded.

Agent Paris pressed his finger to his ear. "Director. The file is uploaded to the secure FTP site."

In his ear, Agent Paris heard Nick Fury speaking. "We have it. Stand by, Agent Paris. Starting SFRS scanning. Should have results in a minute or two. The recording is nice and clear for a change. The New York Department of Corrections appears to have up to date video equipment. Our tax dollars at work."

* * *

><p>On the helicarrier, the S.H.I.E.L.D facial recognition software technician was sitting at a console in front of six huge monitors: three wide by two high arranged in an arc. Her fingers moved expertly over the keyboard in front of her as she first isolated the three individual faces, then placed one front and one profile view of each kid on the huge screens. She typed a command and a green mesh appeared on each facial view, the mesh size getting progressively finer as the software did its thing. The technician sat back and folded her arms. "This shouldn't take long," she said. Names started to scroll by on the left of each screen. Director Fury stood behind her, his hand stroking his chin. <em>Class Three, or possibly even Class Two? Maybe this might take a little longer…<em>

After ninety seconds, the word "MATCH" flashed on the left screens. Glancing up, the technician read: "The blonde one is Annabeth Chase. Her parents are Frederick Chase and her mother is unknown. She has a step mother and two step brothers. Ms. Chase has been affiliated with the criminal Perseus Jackson for about seven years, and is believed to be in a romantic relationship with him currently. Figures" She paused. "The other two will register in a minute."

_A minute passed._

_Two minutes passed._

_Five minutes. _

_Nothing_.

The computer made a loud, low beep. The technician stared at the screen, confused, and typed something in. Another low beep.

She looked back at Fury. "The other two don't exist."

Director Fury stepped forward, stood beside her and stared at the two faces on the centre and right screens. He turned to the technician. "We're S.H.I.E.L.D, not the Boise, Idaho Highway Patrol. Check again. All world and affiliate databases."

The technician typed in a series of commands. A third low beep. Game over.

_No matches found._

"That's not possible," the technician mumbled. "You can't not exist."

Director Fury pressed his finger to his ear. "Agent Paris. One of the kids is Annabeth Chase, a known associate of Perseus Jackson. Sending her documents to you now, and the other two, well, SFRS says they don't exist."

"That's not-" Agent Paris began, but Director Fury cut him off. "Listen up, Agent Paris. I have a feeling that these two are not from around here. And we all know what happened last time we had a… guest like that. You need to find this girl, the two visitors and bring them to Regional Headquarters."

"Yes sir, we're on it." Back at the jail, Agent Paris ended the call and quickly downloaded Annabeth's file. He gestured at the other S.H.E.I.L.D agents. "Move out." Right before the agents left the prison, Agent Paris turned around and nodded his head towards the guard.

"Thank you for your cooperation."

* * *

><p>Moving slowly, the businessman raised his loaded shotgun and aimed it at Percy. Narrowing his eyes at the gun, Percy saw the man's hands twitch. He slowly tightened his leg muscles, ready to jump. Riptide uncapped in his right hand.<p>

**_BANG_****.**

Percy ducked and rolled to the side.

**_BANG. BANG. _**

He swung his foot toward the businessman's leg.

**_BANG._**

The businessman fell down and dropped his shotgun. It skidded across the wharf. Tony reached out and grabbed it. He looked in the chamber, then drew his arm back and chucked the shotgun out and into the Hudson. "Out of ammo. Useless."

Tony's attention snapped back to the fight when the businessman growled. Percy had him pinned down now. _Seems like Perseus has got this,_ he thought. Just as well – the new Iron Man armor was not ready, and it couldn't get here in time anyway even if it was. Tony was impressed by Percy's fighting skill. A little bit of training and he could be on par with a well-trained S.H.I.E.L.D agent. Thinking of S.H.I.E.L.D made Tony realize that he should probably call for back up. Tony jumped up and ran toward Bruce.

Percy's eyes shot up at Tony's sudden movement. In that split second of distraction, the businessman was able to throw Percy off. Percy slammed into the hard wood of the wharf and swore under his breath. Pain crossed his face, but he covered it up quickly and stood up. He gripped Riptide tightly and stood in a battle position.

"What you gonna do now?" Percy called at the businessman. He was stalling, Bruce noted. Maybe waiting for S.H.I.E.L.D to arrive. Then again, maybe not – Percy seemed to be on top of the situation.

The businessman didn't speak, but he did draw a new weapon. Bruce saw Percy's expression change as the man pulled out a sharp, double-edged sword made out of a metal Bruce didn't recognize.

Percy smiled to himself and held up Riptide. _"He wants to sword fight? Then we'll sword fight. Bring it on." _

The man charged toward Percy. Bruce could see the faint outline of a smirk on Percy's face.

The businessman slashed forward wildly. Percy parried it without effort. Pushing the man back, Percy went in for a left jab. The block the businessman used was strong enough to unbalance Percy. The businessman swung with full power. He was aiming toward Percy's neck. A split second before he would have been killed, Percy ducked and rolled to the other side of the businessman. He jumped up and brought Riptide down. The businessman twisted just in time to block the attack, but was knocked over by the force of the blow. Percy slashed down at the man. He rolled out of the way, grabbed his sword and flipped back up. He jabbed toward Percy's right side. Percy pivoted to the side, and aimed for the man's ribcage. His arm was knocked back mid-motion, and Percy let out a shout as it bent in an unnatural way. The businessman slammed into Percy's side. He fell down and smashed his face on the dock. Percy just managed to dodge a deadly strike and get up to attack again.

Percy felt the fight getting repetitive.

Strike. Twist. Dodge. Fall down. Jump up. Repeat.

Time to kick it up a notch, he thought.

The next time the businessman slashed at Percy, he dodged the attack just like usual. But he did something that caught his attacker off guard. He kicked the businessman hard in the ribcage, knocking the wind out of him, and then Percy swiped his hand through the air.

Tony commented "What good is that gonna-" His sentence trailed off as a huge tsunami wave erupted from the water and crashed down on Percy's attacker. The businessman let out a muffled cry as literally tons of water engulfed him, smashing him mercilessly to the ground. Percy saw the businessman's sword drift away and jerked his hand back. The water quickly drained away through the dock and the businessman was left lying still on the hard wooden surface. Percy held Riptide to the man's neck and returned the glare the man was giving him.

Tony and Bruce exchanged opened mouthed glances and nodded. Percy heard a siren as a S.H.I.E.L.D vehicle pulled onto the dock.

"OK. Start talking," hissed Percy to the prone businessman. "Who are you? Why are you trying to kill me? Are you-"

"Mr. Jackson! Step away from the man and drop your weapon. Now!" A new S.H.I.E.L.D agent had appeared behind Percy and held a gun to his head.

"I'm a little busy right now." Percy snapped, turning around to face the agent. He gestured at his other hand which was pressing Riptide against the businessman's neck.

"Drop the weapon, or I will shoot you dead, Jackson," the agent shouted.

"Hey hey hey, it's okay Agent Bossypants!" Tony walked over and stood between Percy and the agent. "I'm sure you know who I am. This guy," Tony continued, pointing at the businessman, "shot down our helicopter and attacked us. Percy was just helping us out."

The agent starter to lower his gun, glaring at Percy.

Percy turned around and looked at Tony. "Thanks for th-"

**_BANG._**

The agent shot at Percy, who dodged the bullet by about a centimeter. Using the distraction to his advantage, the businessman quickly rolled out from under Percy. He grabbed the agent that had shot at Percy, and _Poof! _They both disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

"Well, shit." Tony looked up. "You don't see that every day! And speaking of things you don't see every day, what was the deal with that tidal wave? Pretty convenient, I thought."

Percy bit his lip, regretting using his powers in front of mortals. He had been praying that the mist had covered it up, but Tony and Bruce had clearly seen all of it. Percy was doomed.

Bruce grabbed Percy by the arm and walked him away from where the arriving S.H.I.E.L.D agents were gathering. Tony followed behind, making sure no one came up behind them.

"Percy..." Bruce started quietly. Percy knew what was coming. "Just how did you do that?"

Percy decided to play dumb, Annabeth did say he was a natural, and looked innocently at Bruce. "Do what?"

"Create a huge freaking tsunami wave that almost pulverized that guy!" Tony chimed in. Percy briefly wondered why the mist why the mist hadn't covered it up.

"Oh that." Percy felt himself taking a step back, putting his defenses up.

"Percy, it'll be easier if you just tell us."

Percy's mind raced trying to think up a cover story. "I.. uh.. well." _How do I get out of this? _Percy thought, panicking. "You, know, tsunami activity is quite common in-"

"You three!" A voice called. Their heads spun around. "Director Fury orders you to bring the criminal to the Regional Headquarters. Right now."

Percy seized the opportunity. "Oh, well, we should go." Percy spun on his heels and pushed ahead of Tony and Bruce. He was instantly flanked by multiple guards, who escorted him to the back seat of a SH.I.E.L.D jeep.

Tony and Bruce looked at each other. Bruce said "This kid is not normal."

"You don't say?"

* * *

><p><strong>Thats chapter 5. Hope you liked it. BTW: I wrote the fight scene listening to the X-Men first class soundtrack. It's probbally one of my favourite movie soundtracks of all time. Okey bye now.<strong>

**- Silver **


	6. Chapter 6

**Hey, I'm back. **

**Sorry it took so long to update, I really have no excuse. So I made this chapter longer than normal to make it up to you guys. :)**

* * *

><p>The man looked up sharply at the two servants. "You have failed me again?"<p>

"We were close this time, my Lord," said one of the servants. The other was looking at his feet, unable to meet the man's piercing glare.

"Close isn't good enough. I. Want. Him… **DEAD**!" The man stamped his foot on the floor and the servants could feel the ground shake. "Do you understand?"

One of the servants nodded his head quickly and muttered apologies, backing up toward the large metal door. The other one – the one doing the talking – held his ground as best he could and said "My Lord, he's stronger than we thought."

The man strode slowly towards the brave servant, twirling his staff slightly. "I'm sorry, what was that?" He said, dangerously quiet.

The servant opened his mouth, then closed it, regretting what he had said before. "I mean no offense, my Lord, but the Son of the Sea, he is powerful."

"That… boy isn't powerful. I'll show you powerful!" Fast as lightning, the man slammed the bottom of his staff onto the ground. A massive energy pulse coursed through the staff into the area around them in waves, knocking the servants over. The mute servant finished his journey to the metal door on his knees, yanked at the handle – to no avail – and finally broke his silence: "please my Lord, have mercy!"

"Mercy?! I know of no such thing." The man narrowed his eyes menacingly and his grip around the staff tightened until his knuckles turned white. The man closed his pale eyes slowly, feeling the rush of limitless power, and enjoying the screams of his inferiors.

"Please stop!" The man's eyes shot open as the other servant shouted over the deafening buzz of power. The servant paused, reluctant to continue. "Listen to me, **Loki**!"

"My name will be your last word." Loki shouted as he brought his staff up again and pointed it at the servant. A burning hot current ran through the servant, setting his eyes on fire. His scream pierced the air. Then he disappeared.

Loki lowered his weapon. The silence was deafening. The surviving servant whimpered, his hand still on the handle of the metal door. Loki spun on his heel and strutted out of his room, down the hall to the containment center.

"How are the preparations going?" Loki twirled his staff between two fingers as he entered the room. "We're on a tight schedule. Everyone we need will be in the same place, and vulnerable. In three days. We will never get this chance again."

The large figure did not look up. "We're right on schedule sir, but you never told me why we are doing this."

Loki paused.

"We're doing this so I can fulfill my destiny. Which is to rule."

"I'm not sure I can go through with this."

"You Greeks were always cowardly. When I pulled you out of that blasted pit, you were as good as dead!" Loki snarled.

"I got out of that pit without any help from you."

"Sure, keep on believing that." Loki said. "But you and I know the truth. You owe me. So you better listen to what I say get back to work."

"Did you neutralize the Son of the Sea?"

"We're working on it. Soon."

"Because if he's still active, your destiny may have to wait…"

* * *

><p>Nico grabbed his companions' hands and enveloped the three of them in shadows.<p>

"NO NO NO-" Thalia barely had time to protest before all the air disappeared and the drowning space roller-coaster feeling returned. With a vengeance. When they emerged from the shadows moments later, the feeling dispersed. Thalia was astounded that she had managed to not puke this time.

"I hate you so much," she mumbled.

"That's the last time I'm gonna be able to that for a while." Nico said to Thalia and Annabeth, but they weren't really listening. They were looking around the area.

"This is the epicenter of the explosion?" Annabeth turned to Nico for clarification. "The explosion we saw from the park?"

"I guesstimated." He shrugged.

"Well, looks like you guessed right." Annabeth pointed toward a collection of emergency vehicles surrounding a destroyed helicopter. They pushed through the crowd of onlookers until they were right against the barricades.

"S.H.I.E.L.D." Nico gestured at the word stenciled on the barricades. "We're on the right track."

Thalia locked eyes with a guard behind the barricades and they stared at each other for a moment. Thalia could sense the guard sizing her up and she was doing the same. She broke eye contact first, as she didn't want to look suspicious. "_A bit late for that, might as well have a LOOK AT ME I'M SUSPICIOUS tee shirt…"_ she thought. The guard looked away. Watching him out of the corner of her eye, Thalia saw him walk over to the Commanding Officer and point at them.

"Guys… I think we need-"

"Percy!" Annabeth said a bit too loud. She lowered her voice again. "He's over there, by that truck." Thalia and Nico followed her gaze and saw him. Percy Jackson. Surrounded by a dozen guards and under restraint. Nothing new.

"We have to get closer to him," she said. Thalia and Annabeth started weaving sideways through the crowd towards Percy, with Nico bringing up the rear. Thalia glanced behind her. She saw the guard from a moment ago following the three of them with his eyes. Thalia knew that the guard had figured out that they were after Percy. "_They probably recognize us from the prison_," she thought, biting her lip. The guard pointed at her again, speaking urgently with the Commanding Officer and the other guards. "_Uh oh…_" Thalia quickly grabbed Nico and Annabeth and pulled them deeper into the crowd.

"We've got a bit of problem," she whispered, flicking her eyes to the side. "The guards over there, they recognize us."

Nico and Annabeth glanced over at them and quickly looked away. "That's not good."

"We've got to let Percy know we're here." Annabeth insisted.

"Alright. Get ready to run," Thalia smirked as she pushed her way towards the barricade again. Annabeth and Nico locked eyes for a moment then followed suit.

"PERCY!" Thalia shouted at the top of her lungs. "PERCY JACKSON!"

"Thalia! What are you doing?" Annabeth ran up next up her.

"Letting Percy know were here – I mean, it _was_ your idea. PEEEERCYYYY!"

The raven-haired boy whipped his head toward them, and the guard holding him pulled him back. A look of happiness crossed his face as he registered the three of them, but it was quickly replaced when his eyes moved on to something on her left.

"DUCK!" He shouted. The three didn't question. They hit the wooden dock seconds before a gun went off, followed immediately by a loud thunk as something speared into the dock to the right of Annabeth's head. Crowds screamed and panicked. Annabeth ran her hand along the dock and found an object stuck into the wooden boards. She pulled it out, held it up and inspected it quickly. _"Tranquilizer. Well, at least they're not trying to kill us."_ She threw the dart down and jumped back onto their feet.

"Run!" she shouted, and they all took off, joining the panicking crowd rushing away from the barricades.

The Commanding Officer barked orders at the guards. "Orders from Fury, he needs them alive. Pursue, no deadly force. Apprehend and bring them to Regional Headquarters! MOVE!"

The friends kept running. "You know, I said we had to let Percy know we're here, I don't think you needed to let everyone in New York know as well. That really could have been executed a bit more subtly, in my opinion." Annabeth said between breaths.

"They were going to catch us eventually," Thalia rolled her eyes. "So why not speed up the process?" She shrugged as she ran.

"Soldiers at 9 o'clock." Nico gasped, without breaking stride.

"What does 9 o'clock mean again?" Thalia asked.

Annabeth started "Well it's the angle of the-"

"Not now!" Nico shouted.

He reached for his sword, but Annabeth pulled his hand back. "Don't. That's only going to make the situation worse." Nico glared at her for a moment, but he dropped his arm.

"Stop with the small talk! Let's go!" Thalia ran into an alley past the two of them, hitting Nico in the back of the head in the process.

They ran another few blocks, then Annabeth glanced behind them and came to a stop, breathing heavily. "Annabeth?" Thalia asked.

"I think we lost them," she said slowly, her eyes scanning the area.

Thalia and Nico let out a sigh of relief and leaned up against a wall, gasping for air.

Annabeth looked at the two of them. "That was too easy." Nico and Thalia could practically see the gears in her mind spinning, analyzing and evaluating the situation. "They're planning something."

Thalia looked up. "So what now?"

"Duh. This is New York. We get a cab."

* * *

><p>"Good afternoon Director Fury," the robotic voice said as he entered the elevator in the Regional Headquarters. Seconds later, the elevator dinged and the doors opened. He strutted out, and walked into the main technology division.<p>

The agents nearest to him saluted as he entered, and the movement spread through the room.

"Director Fury, sir," a young agent called. Fury walked over to the woman.

"What is it?"

"We've picked up live security footage of the class threes." The agent didn't make eye contact with the director.

"Show me."

The agent sat down in the seat and pulled up a grainy live feed recording from a taxi cab. Three teens were sitting together in the back and mumbling to each other. Fury leaned forward.

"That's definitely them." The director tapped the screen and turned to the agent. "Is there sound on this feed?"

"No sir."

"Do we know where they're heading?"

"We've been monitoring their route, and the most probable destination is, well, here," the agent reported.

"They're coming for Perseus." Fury paused, formulating a strategic plan in his head. "That could actually work out quite well." Fury straightened up. He pulled out his phone and walked away from the agents.

* * *

><p>Tony's phone rang as he was driving. Bruce was in the passenger seat and Percy was handcuffed in the back with a guard on each side. They'd decided to up the security in the truck. Not that they really needed any more with two avengers in the front, one being an enormous green rage monster – on a part time basis, at least…<p>

Tony smirked as he looked at the caller ID. "The one and only Tony Stark speaking! Live and in person!" He tilted his head. "Well not technically in person."

"Stark. Bring the prisoner to the Regional Headquarters." Director Fury's deep, serious voice replied.

"We're heading there anyway." Tony said, ignoring a red light. "Thought we'd come and get a new helicopter. I promise not to break this one."

"Change of plan. No helicopter."

"How come?"

"I need to speak with the prisoner in person, and I'm here." Fury said, then mumbled something Tony didn't quite catch.

"What was that?"

"I'll explain when I see you," Fury answered, then hung up before Tony had a chance to sign off with a witty comeback.

"Could he be any more suspicious?" Tony turned to Bruce who shrugged. Tony jammed on the brakes and took an illegal U-turn. "I know a short cut."

* * *

><p>Tony, Bruce and the guard escorted Percy into the Regional Headquarters and straight into the elevator. After being searched and scanned by security, of course. The only thing they saw on Percy was his pen, which they confiscated. Percy nodded solemnly when they told him this, but he was laughing in his head because he knew Riptide would simply reappear in his pocket in a few minutes. On the other hand, he thought, if anything were to happen, it's not like he'd be able to actually uncap Riptide, since his hands were cuffed behind his back. <em>Maybe I could hold it in my teeth<em>, he thought…

"Good afternoon Mr. Stark, Doctor Banner, Agent Dennis and murder suspect in custody Perseus Jackson." The elevator voice named each person.

"How does it know who I am?" Percy said, looking around for the source of the voice.

"The elevator has cameras that scan your physical appearance and the computer searches all the S.H.I.E.L.D. databases in the world for an exact match, all in barely a second." Tony explained as the doors opened. "We're working on making it faster…"

"What if you're not in the S.H.I.E.L.D. databases?"

Tony smirked "Then you're not from around here."

"Which is one of the reasons you're here, Perseus," a new voice said behind him. Percy spun around in surprise and found himself eye to eye with an eye-patch.

"Oh, eye. Hi! I mean hi! Hi..." Percy awkwardly stepped back. In front of him was a tall dark man with a long black trench coat and an eye-patch to match. He was glaring at Percy with, apparently, quite a lot of hatred for someone he just met.

Percy leaned over and mumbled to Tony "Did I say something?"

"I think mentioning the eye could have ticked him off," Tony replied. "But that's just kind of his resting expression so I think you're probably good." Tony patted the teenager on the back, while pushing him a bit closer to the Director.

"You're Perseus Jackson," the man addressed him coldly.

"The one and only." Percy said cockily, regaining his composure. "I would shake your hand, but I'm a bit tied up. And you are?"

"Great, just what we need. Stark 2.0" the man said. "I'm Director Fury." He turned and walked in the opposite direction. Percy walked behind Fury with his two guards helping him along, one on each arm.

"Wait! Where are we going?" Percy stopped abruptly. The guards stopped with him, and pulled out some serious looking firepower in case he made a move.

"Right here." The director stopped at a large metal door. He typed in a six letter and number code on the keypad next to the door and it unlocked with several loud clicks. The first guard walked in then gestured for Percy to follow him.

"Uh, no thanks."

"Do I look like I'm asking? Now get in there. Or we'll drag you," Fury said. The second armed guard gripped Percy's arm even harder and started to push him into the room. Percy resisted – he wasn't the biggest fan of tight spaces – but the guard overpowered him easily. Fury walked into the room just behind Percy and locked the door. Percy was pushed down into a metal chair and his handcuffs were snapped into a ring on the back. The guards then moved to the two opposite corners of the room, space age guns armed and ready. There was a metal desk in front of Percy's chair. The director leaned on the desk, evaluating Percy. There was a small stack of files to the director's left, CONFIDENTIAL in large red letters stamped on the front of the first.

"Now, Perseus-"

"Percy," he interrupted.

"Percy," Fury continued. "I'm going to ask you some questions, and you are going to answer," The Director raised an eyebrow. "Truthfully."

"Okie dokie." Percy shrugged.

"Your name is Perseus Jackson?"

"Last time I checked."

"You were born August 18th 1993?"

"Still plenty of time to buy me a present."

"You mother is Sally Jackson?"

"Correctamundo."

"And your father?"

"Don't know him. Never met him," Percy lied.

The director wrote that down.

"You've been charged for murdering an unknown man in a subway station. This is correct?"

"Pass."

"You can't just skip the question."

"Can I forfeit the round?" Percy wondered. "Call a friend?"

"This isn't a game show, Percy. You're starting to piss me off, and you really don't want that."

"I take it back. Game shows usually have better sets." He gestured with his head at the grey walls and the metal décor. "Carry on."

* * *

><p>Tony and Bruce watched the interrogation on a computer Tony had used to hack into the security cameras.<p>

Tony burst out laughing. "I like this kid."

* * *

><p>"Could you tell us why you murdered that man?" Fury leaned a little closer, clearly annoyed with Percy's responses.<p>

"I already went through all these questions with the police. Two or three times. Look through your files there, I'm sure every word I said is in there somewhere." Percy looked up at Fury and cut straight to the chase. "You already know the answer to all of these questions. So what's the deal? Why did you bring me here?"

Fury straightened his back and breathed through his nose. "Okay. You want to know why we brought you here?"

Percy gave him a 'that's what I just said' look and nodded slowly, like he was talking to someone who did not understand English.

"Fine." Fury narrowed his eyes. "There was a blue stone pendant around the neck of the man you killed. That blue stone is almost an identical match to the power source of an extremely dangerous, non-earthly weapon. It can't be a coincidence that the guy that you killed happened to have that on him."

"I didn't notice what he was wearing. I was sort of preoccupied."

"Mr. Jackson, the last time someone had something like this on Earth, the world almost ended."

"I don't know anything about this." Percy answered truthfully. "And what do you mean the world almost ended?"

"Don't lie to me!" yelled Fury. "Do you expect me to believe that you didn't hear about the Battle of Manhattan last year?"

"Uh, I was sort of preoccupied last year as well" Percy said._ "If trying to stop the evil earth mother from rising counts as being preoccupied_…"

"You must have been very preoccupied. Millions of aliens, led by a deposed Norse god-" Percy's eyebrows rose at that, "attempted to invade the earth."

"I should really pay more attention to the news," Percy concluded. "Anyways, tell me about this Norse god. Who was he? Why did he want to end the world?"

"Mr. Jackson. I am interrogating you. You are not interrogating me."

"Just tell me this, and..." Percy tried to think of a bargaining tool. He couldn't think of anything. Annabeth usually did the talking. "Just tell me this."

Fury gave in. "His name was Loki. God of trickery and mischief."

"Why did he want to end the world?"

"He didn't want to end it. He wanted to rule it. The ending thing was sort of collateral damage. According to his brother Thor, Loki wanted to be worshipped and feared, but because their father Odin gave Thor the throne of their weird godly kingdom rather than Loki, he came down here with a non-earthly weapon related to your murder victim's medallion, a few thousand alien buddies and tried to take over. Now. Back to your interrogation, Mr. Jackson."

"Wait a second. You said 'one reason' a minute ago. What was the other reason why you brought me here?" Percy asked.

"Those friends of yours that showed up at the helicopter crash?" Fury looked at Percy. "Well, something has come up."

"What?"

"We did identity scans on the three of them." Fury crossed his arms. "Only one showed up." He opened a file and slid it across the table. Percy leaned forward and looked at it.

**"****Annabeth Chase"** was written in large font on the top of the page. There were two photos clipped to the page. One was her passport photo. Percy was there with her when she got it done.

Percy's eyes shifted to the other photo.

It wasn't very good quality, quite grainy. In the corner of the picture was the date and time, July 17, 13:38. Earlier today. Most likely from a security camera. The room looked familiar. Percy pieced it all together. It was taken at the police station he was being held in. Annabeth was speaking to a man at the desk. Beside her were Nico and Thalia. They had come to visit him, but he was already with S.H.I.E.L.D.

"The other two don't exist in S.H.I.E.L.D. databases." Fury pointed at Nico and Thalia in the photo. "We don't know who they are. But judging by the events that occurred at the crash, you do."

"You must have made a mistake." Percy said innocently.

"We don't make mistakes."

"Well you sorta did. Like, they clearly do actually exist." Percy reasoned.

"Just tell us who they are and what they can do, and maybe we'll let you go."

"Well, I don't know them that well."

Fury glared at him, knowing full well he was lying. "Come on. We saw you kissing one of them when she visited you in jail."

Percy panicked but quickly recovered. "Well._"_ Percy smirked. "I _am_ irresistible."

"I'm not feeling it." Fury deadpanned. "But I'll tell you what you'll be feeling if you don't tell me what I want to know."

Percy didn't say anything, even when Fury asked him again.

"Who are they?!" Fury slammed his fist on the desk and glared at Percy.

Something inside Percy snapped. He dropped his sarcastic, clueless teenager act and glared back. Now, most people can't stand Fury's interrogation glare. He'll pull it once and they'll crack. Tell him everything he needs to know. It's his secret weapon. But Percy Jackson had stared down monsters and gods and titans and giants and immortals. He wouldn't let some angry mortal make him betray his own family.

Percy returned the glare, green eyes stormy and rough, almost like a storm at sea. "I'm not telling you that." In his head Percy was telling himself to calm down, he could feel water in a glass somewhere, starting to rise.

"Listen here, kid. This is bigger than you could imagine." Fury growled. "Your friends aren't normal. And we have reasons to suspect you aren't either."

They stared at each other for a moment. Percy wasn't backing down. Fury slammed his palms into the table, but Percy didn't even jump. Fury made eye contact with the two guards, giving them a silent message, then straightened up and stomped out of the room. Percy followed him with his eyes.

He waited until Fury left and locked the door, and then he relaxed. He leaned back in his chair and breathed out.

"This isn't good."

* * *

><p><strong>Hope you enjoyed this extra long chapter! <strong>

**-Silver Simmons**


	7. Chapter 7

**GUESS WHOS BACK! I'm sorry this took so long to update! Here's the long awaited new chapter!**

* * *

><p>"Nothing." Fury stomped into the situation room, looked at Banner and Tony, and slammed the door. "He gave me absolutely nothing."<p>

"Maybe you're losing your touch One-Eye," Tony smirked as he leaned on a filing cabinet. Fury growled and Tony raised his hands in surrender. "I'm just saying."

Fury ignored him and continued: "I've already called Thor and asked him to check on the Tesseract." Nick placed the files he had used during the interrogation on his desk and looked up. "To make sure no one's stolen it and is putting pieces of it on chains."

Bruce nodded. Tony sat back into a chair and raised his hand. He waited until both Bruce and Fury were staring at him before dropping his hand. "OK. Question, how did the professional spy get out interrogated by an eighteen year old?"

Banner winced. Fury glared at the files on his desk and responded sarcastically. "You can go fill out a complaint if it pleases you. Have a nice day."

Tony stood up, rolled his eyes, turned on his heel and walked out.

"I'll go up to the lab and run some tests on something." Banner said as he left.

"Director Fury, sir!" An agent called over from his desk.

Fury walked over to the agent's desk. "What is it?"

"The unknown Class Threes have exited the cab. It dropped them off at the corner of 52nd Street."

"Okay." Fury stepped back and raised his voice so everyone could hear him. "Send in a small team and bring them in."

* * *

><p>"Drop us off here." Annabeth stopped the driver. They were a block down from the SHIELD regional headquarters. It was a tall grey office building that blended in with the skyline. It had started to get dark, which was helping Nico regain his strength. He had shadow traveled them all across New York earlier, practically draining his power. And he would need it for what they were about to do.<p>

"Okay." The taxi driver pulled over. Annabeth, Nico and Thalia got out and walked towards the building. The three demigods had mastered the art of blending in, which actually wasn't that hard in New York. As they got closer to the building, they didn't see anything special about it.

Suddenly Nico stopped. He glanced around for moment, then quickly pulled Thalia and Annabeth away from the crowd on the sidewalk and into an alley.

"What?" Thalia crossed her arms.

Nico was still glancing around, scanning the crowds as they walked past. "I saw a guy just standing around up the street there, big guy, dark suit, leaning on a No Parking sign, checking out the crowd, might as well have had a sign on reading GOVERNMENT AGENT."

Annabeth and Thalia looked out at the crowd. They couldn't see him, but they trusted Nico. "You're probably right," said Annabeth. "But you know, he may not be looking for us." Annabeth turned her head and looked back into the alley. "But – just in case – maybe we should go around the back."

Twenty yards later, the alley turned a blind corner.

**"FREEZE!"** Five agents in dark suits were standing there, heavily armed.

They spun around looking for a way out, but three more agents appeared behind them, blocking the way back to the busy street. Nico recognized the agent in the middle of the three as the guy from the street. He was smiling unpleasantly. There was nowhere to run. The three of them went back to back. They didn't take out their weapons, but they had a hand on them just in case.

"Nico." Thalia whispered without looking at him. "Get us out of here."

"I can't." Nico sighed. "All out of battery."

"Then we fight, on my signal." Annabeth said, just quietly enough for only the three of them to hear.

The middle agent smiled again. "You're coming with us."

"Why should we?" Thalia snarled. Annabeth put a hand up stop Thalia from doing anything stupid.

"Because we have your friend Perseus."

Annabeth paused. "Who's Perseus?"

"Perseus?" Thalia crossed her arms and played along. "That's a stupid name." Nico nodded vigorously.

The agent stopped smiling and looked at them, one after the other. Not pleasantly. "Don't waste my time. You all visited him in jail, we have it on video tape."

Annabeth thought on her feet. "Well, we often visit jails for our church group. You know, reach out to troubled youth. Never met him before yesterday."

The agent raised his eyebrows. "You were kissing him."

"He was particularly troubled."

The agent growled. "Good one, Goldilocks, I'm laughing on the inside. You know, we can do this all day. But why don't we just cut to the chase? We have him, we can take you to him." The agent grinned nastily. "And we are going to take you to him, one way or another. So we can do this the hard way or the easy way." He paused and slowly looked over the three. "And you wouldn't want us to do it the hard way – you're just a bunch of kids."

The three exchanged glances. Silent agreement passed between them.

"We'll save you the trouble of doing it the hard way. Don't want to hurt any of you, you know, with you guys all so close to retirement." Nico spoke up for the first time.

The agent stopped grinning as if he had been slapped. He spoke into his watch and a newspaper delivery van came down the alley and parked. The three got into the back and sat on the floor. An agent closed the rear doors, smacked the side of the van, and it drove off.

Thalia broke the silence in the back of the van. "Well at least we found him. Sort of."

"Just not really in the way we wanted." Annabeth said.

Nico looked up. "Just a bunch of kids, eh? We'll see about that."

* * *

><p>Percy looked around the room to see if there was anything he could use. As this was a holding cell – not long term accommodations – there was no plumbing, which was a pity. But…<p>

"YO! GUARD!" Percy slammed his handcuffed hands down on the desk in front of him a few times, trying to get a guard's attention.

The guard standing outside the cell heard his shout, walked over and opened a small hatch in the door. He looked in suspiciously. "What do you want?"

"A glass of water. Please." Percy replied. "I'm thirsty, I've been in this cell all day." Percy was doing his puppy dog face. "Come on, this isn't Guantanamo Bay."

The guard thought for a moment and nodded. He closed the hatch, and Percy heard his footsteps walk away. The same footsteps returned a few moments later. The hatch opened, the guard checked the room, closed the hatch, unlocked and opened the door. The guard walked in, holding a small paper cup of water. He put the cup in front of Percy.

"Thank you so much," Percy read the nametag on the man's chest. "Agent Young." Percy gave the agent an Academy Award winning smile. He looked about as threatening as a goldfish.

The guard started walking away. Percy rattled his handcuffs. "Hey, maybe you could take off these handcuffs for a bit? Please? It's hard to drink in cuffs, man. I'm locked up in a cell, what's the worst I could do?"

The guard thought about it for moment, then shrugged his shoulders. "I suppose so."

Percy held his hands up. The guard unlocked the young prisoner's handcuffs and placed them on the table. Percy rubbed his slightly sore wrists and leaned back in his chair. "Wow, those were pretty tight. Thanks so much."

The guard smiled slightly. "Just don't tell my supervisors." Percy smiled sweetly. The guard walked out of Percy's cell.

Percy stopped smiling as soon as the door closed. His plan was going well so far. It was usually Annabeth who came up with the plans, but she was unavailable. Percy took a small sip of the water and glanced around the room. The door hatch was closed. Time to leave. He picked up the cup of water, stood up and walked quietly to the door. He bent the paper cup to form a spout and slowly poured the water into the door lock through the keyhole. He closed his eyes and felt the water pooling inside the lock mechanism. "I hope you're not just outside the door, Agent Young," he thought, and then he commanded the water to boil. Immediately.

_**BANG**_

The lock exploded and the door flew open. Percy ran out into the corridor, expecting to see hundreds of heavily armed guards coming towards him. But no one was there. "Hope no one heard that," he muttered to himself as he looked around. He was standing in a short corridor with empty cells lining either side, with a turn at the right end of the hall and a staircase at the left. His hand was in his pocket resting on Riptide. Sure, his sword couldn't hurt mortals, but it could frighten them if required.

"FREEZE!" A shout echoed down the hall. Percy snapped his head round in surprise. Agent Young was standing there, bringing up his weapon. Alarms started blaring and Percy could hear the hurried footsteps of many men coming towards him. So much for a quick getaway.

* * *

><p>"Director." A voice called from across the situation room. Fury looked up from his desk and stood up.<p>

Exiting the elevator was Agent Cooper, followed by three teenagers. They were surrounded by guards.

The party stopped in front of Fury's desk. Cooper looked at Fury. "Here are the suspected Class Threes." The guards stepped away from the teens. The blonde one, Annabeth Chase, calmly met Fury's stare. The dark haired girl glared challengingly. The boy was looking down, hair in front of his eyes. But it wasn't cowardly. Fury could tell the boy was scanning the room for threats and escape routes. His gaze never stayed in the same place for more than 10 seconds. He looked about 15 years old, maybe younger.

"Annabeth Chase, I assume." Fury looked at the blonde.

"Yes, and you are?" Annabeth replied sharply.

Fury met her gaze and crossed his arms. "Who I am isn't important, Blondie. Who you three are, though, that's the million dollar question."

"We're nobodies." Nico spoke up, raising his head slowly.

"I know that. Do you know why?" He paused. "Because according to all the records in the world, you two simply don't exist" He pointed at Nico and Thalia. "Now you guys are going to tell us what we want to know or we'll put you somewhere and throw away the key." Fury threatened.

"I want my phone call!"" Thalia shouted. "We have rights!"

"Sorry, only people who exist have rights." Nick Fury glared at them. "Tell us who you are. Remember, we have Perseus."

Suddenly alarms start blaring. An announcement came over the PA: "Attention. Prisoner Perseus Jackson has escaped. All available personnel report for duty." Annabeth, Nico and Thalia glanced at each other and Thalia flashed a grin. "You have Percy, eh?"

Nick Fury quickly took charge. He grabbed the PA microphone on his desk. "Agent numbers 100-140 go search the right wing. 141-180, left wing." The PA made his voice sound enormous. "Guards already positioned in sections 15-20 be on your guard, arm your weapons. Do not engage unless attacked. Do not use live ammunition, we need Jackson alive." He turned off the microphone and turned to the four guards surrounding the three teens. "Keep an eye on them." Nick Fury then walked down the hall with another agent reading out the details of the escape. He shook his head. "He blew up the lock? How?"

* * *

><p>Percy made a split second decision and bolted to the right. Shouts followed him down the hallway. He ran down the corridor and turned the corner. He froze. There were eight agents coming towards him, maybe thirty feet away. The lead agent shouted into his headset. "We have eyes on the escapee."<p>

Percy instinctively reached for Riptide, and then remembered it wouldn't help him out much against mortals. He glanced around, seeing a door just slightly ahead of him on the left. Maybe a fire escape? Hope it's not locked…

The agents stopped. Three agents took out their guns, set them to stun and trained them on Percy. He put his hands up in surrender. "Okay okay, you got me, no need for the guns, I was just going out for a cheeseburger, you know?" The agents shared glances and relaxed slightly.

Then Percy faked to the right and sprung toward the door, which was unlocked. He slammed the door behind him and locked it. He turned around and surveyed the room. It was a janitor's room, stocked with equipment and supplies. Okay, time to improvise. Percy sighed and started to search the small room for anything that could help him. He saw a camera mounted on the left wall, looked at it, smiled and waved. Guess toilet roll theft must be a big problem, good to see steps were being taken. He heard the guards banging on the door, commanding him to come out. Percy looked at the far wall and saw a sink with two faucets. And water pipes behind the faucets, passing into the wall. Aha…

"We're breaking down this door kid."

Percy armed himself with a mop. Moptide, he thought, and grinned. Bring it…

"On my mark."

Percy readied himself and the pipes started to crack. "Now!" Percy wasn't sure how they did it but the door came crashing down. The guards crowded into the room and this time all their weapons were raised. There seemed to be more guards now. "Drop the... broom… or we will use deadly force!"

"Now this is all a misunderstanding-" Halfway through his own sentence, he made the pipes burst violently. The wall around the pipes exploded. An unbelievable amount of water and steam sprayed everywhere, sending the agents into a confusion that Percy used to his advantage. He struck a few down with his mop but he was ultimately overcome and lost his weapon. He swung his arms inwards, taking control of the water on the floor. The water launched into the air in a violent wave, hitting the agent closest to him like a train. Percy cringed when the man smacked into the wall. He really didn't like using his powers on mortals, but right now he didn't really have a choice. Tendrils of water rose up from the pool on the floor and quickly knocked the other agents' guns to the ground.

The agent that was doing all the talking yelled into his headset. "We've got a Code Red situation here, Director! Looks like hydrokinesis!"

* * *

><p>"Hydrokinesis? So you're in a water fight?" Fury deadpanned into his earpiece, as he watched the live feed of the fight at his desk. "Do you want me to send down some guys with Super Soakers?"<p>

Fury turned his attention back to his monitor. This kid was well trained. He could think on his feet and improvise, which is rare, and even rarer if it actually works out for you. He was powerful, for sure, and his water talent was, well, unbelievable, but the expert spy could tell that Percy was holding back. He was trying not to hurt his captors, which was strange for a murderer. Fury started to wonder if maybe there was another explanation for Percy's behavior on the subway, but his train of thought was interrupted by the sound of chaos down the hallway.

Fury pulled up security cameras one by one until he found the source of the sound. He raised his eyebrows in surprise and annoyance. "Damn."

The three teenagers were fighting, trying to escape. And they were winning, by a huge margin. It was three against nine agents, a few agents already down. He saw Annabeth take one out with a complicated move, before moving onto the next. Blonde widow, Fury thought – he couldn't help himself. Smiling, the girl with the black hair punched one guard in the stomach and held her fist there for a moment. The guard seemed to be having a seizure. He fell to the ground unconscious after she removed her fist. It was like he'd been hit by a Taser or electrocuted, but the girl carried no weapon in her hand. The boy elbowed his opponent in the nose, distracting him, and then slipped around behind the guard and kicked his knees out, sending him to the floor, then knocked the agent out with a surprisingly gentle blow to the head. They finished off the others pretty quickly, working as a unit. The three exchanged a few words and the boy nodded. The girls both grabbed hold of the boy's left arm. He stood still for a minute, concentrating. Fury watched, not knowing what to expect. The shadows inside the room started to gather around the three of them, then the teenagers just… disappeared, and the shadows went back to normal.

Fury rested his chin on his hand, watching the fight over in his head.

These kids were well trained, just like Percy. Perhaps all trained together. Except they all had their individual fighting styles. Annabeth knows exactly what her opponent is going to do and strikes back before you've even hit her. It's like she's moving at normal speed and her opponent is stuck in slow motion. She analyzes her adversary and the battlefield and uses it to her advantage. Natural instincts like that can be hard to come by. And useful, he thought. The black haired girl fought with a snarky smile, like she knows she's going to win. She isn't afraid of going up against anyone. She fought straight on, no sneaky strikes. She wants her challengers to know that she has beaten them. The opposite was true for the boy. He didn't let his enemy know they had lost until it was too late. And those Class Three powers, too…

Fury snapped himself out of his mental review of the fight. Fury knew where the kids were going. He scrolled through the security camera feeds until he came to the janitor's room and mentally noted the location. He armed himself with his shotgun and swung open his door.

* * *

><p>The newly disarmed agents ran at Percy, throwing well timed punches and kicks. They worked as a unit, and two agents soon had Percy pinned against the corridor wall outside the janitor's room. Every few seconds a third agent would deliver a new blow to Percy's stomach, making it difficult for Percy to regain control.<p>

The third agent smiled between punches. "We've got the escapee pinned, Director."

"Understood. I'm on my way." Fury said over his com.

The agent took off his headset and got into Percy's face. "Good effort, kid, but nobody gets past SHIELD."

Percy's gaze shifted slightly, to a point just behind the agent. "Yup, nobody." The agent barely had time to register what Percy had said before he hit the floor, out cold. Annabeth stood there, holding a fire extinguisher, in front of Nico and Thalia. The three jumped into action, taking out guards left and right. Percy twisted viciously to work himself free of the two agents holding his arms and joined in the brawl. Soon the fight was over, and the four were left panting in the hall.

"Well, what took you so long?" Percy broke the silence.

Annabeth smiled. "You know, New York, just had to do some shopping."

"And some sightseeing. It's changed since last time I was here," added Thalia.

"So no weapons eh?" Percy asked.

"Nope. They took my knife." Annabeth huffed.

Thalia grinned. "Didn't really feel like showing Medusa's face to a bunch of mortals."

"Yeah, not in the mood to kill anyone right now." Nico said. Percy couldn't tell if he was joking. "We can beat them without weapons anyway."

"Okay so how do we get out of here?" Percy asked, glancing around.

"We go down, you idiot." Thalia rolled her eyes.

Percy ignored her and turned to Annabeth. She shrugged her shoulders. "The layout of this building is complicated. I'd say we go with Thalia's plan."

* * *

><p>"Director, motion sensors have picked up activity in staircase 16," a voice over his communicator said. "We've checked the security feed, it's them. They are heading downstairs."<p>

Fury thought for a moment. "Send a team outside to meet them by the bottom floor exit door. I'll meet up with them there."

* * *

><p><strong>"FREEZE!"<strong> Percy, Annabeth, Thalia and Nico flew out the stairwell door and were immediately face to face with about a million guns.

"I've heard that too many times today, can't you guys come up with something else?" Percy sighed, putting up his hands.

Fury stood at the front of the agents, with a shotgun, but he was holding it casually, down beside his right leg. "Now listen to me, you four."

Thalia rolled her eyes. "Make me, pirate man!"

"Why should we?" Nico crossed his arms.

Fury glared at Thalia and raised his voice slightly. "Because we are not your enemy. Our enemy is whoever tried to kill you." He pointed at Percy. "On the subway, and again while we were bringing you in."

Annabeth spoke up confidently. "Prove it. Put the guns down."

Fury look at his agents and nodded slowly. They all lowered their weapons and put them on the ground.

Percy extended his arms, "Group hug, everyone?"

"Maybe later." Fury looked at him. "Now, I've seen what you four can do."

The teenagers glanced at each other, knowing they had some explaining to do.

Fury continued. "You have talent, and you show promise. I'd like to make you a proposal. Work with us, and we'll keep quiet on your… special abilities. Not ask too many questions. If you won't help us, we'll have no choice but to keep you four as prisoners, as it is our job to deal with unknown threats." He paused. "So what do you say? Do we have a deal?" The Director finished, and looked at the teens expectantly.

The four shared a silent conversation. Percy was the one who answered. "It's a bit of a one sided proposal, don't you think? It's not like we have much choice." He sighed. "It's a deal. We'll do it."

* * *

><p><strong>Hope you enjoyed! I'm going to go write the next chapter. Thanks so much for reading!<strong>

**-Silver**


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